


Only Little

by DonTheRock



Category: Andi Mack (TV)
Genre: Childhood Friends, Explicit Language, Falling In Love, Forbidden Love, High School, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Love, M/M, No Smut, Romance, Teen Romance, Teenagers, Young Love, soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-06
Updated: 2020-06-02
Packaged: 2021-03-02 19:21:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 17,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24031945
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DonTheRock/pseuds/DonTheRock
Summary: When TJ Kippen moves back to Shadyside after a long time of being gone, he finds his childhood best friend, Cyrus Goodman. Naturally, they start to talk, but TJ's mom doesn't want TJ and Cyrus being friends again, and neither of the boys know why.
Relationships: Cyrus Goodman & T. J. Kippen, Cyrus Goodman/T. J. Kippen, Tyrus – Relationship
Comments: 81
Kudos: 143





	1. Prologue

Cyrus Goodman had never before faced a predicament this formidable. He'd only ever seen these kind of possessive, rambunctious creatures in the animal documentaries that he enjoyed watching with his parents. His mother said it would be fun. She failed to inform him that he was stepping into a living, breathing jungle today for the first time, one he would have to navigate without a map of any sort. He was left on his own to attempt to interpret the actions of the wildlife roaming before him. 

At five years old, Cyrus found kindergarten to be a trivial use of his time. Why would he want to come to a tiny room filled with a bunch of other kids and learn how collections of squiggly lines should be pronounced when he could be at home playing with his dinosaurs? Actually, he had promised he would take them to a volcano today, and he was breaking that promise by simply being here. There were no volcanoes in the jungle, and no dinosaurs. All that this jungle had was the thunder of a piano being smacked by overly-excited clouds, the trickle of beaded necklaces being flung near the dress-up station, and the roar of many, many screaming children. And yet the safari leader didn't even bat an eye. She was in the middle of a lion's den, and she couldn't be bothered to do anything but read her book. 

Fortunately, there was one spot that wasn't occupied, the table of magic sand. Odd for sand to be in the jungle, but Cyrus didn't question it. He sat down in the chair and picked up the first archeological tool, a bright yellow, plastic scooper. Maybe there were dinosaur bones hidden under this sand? He began digging, searching for his next greatest discovery, the one that would make his dinosaur friends at home proud. 

"What are you doing?"

Cyrus looked up to see a boy. His blonde hair was messy, and his shirt had colourful marks on it. Had he been in a fight with a tie-dyed tiger? Did he come across a patch of rainbow berries and get the juice all over his shirt? If so, at least he could be certain that those berries were non-toxic, washable, and smelled like fruit. 

"I'm looking for dinosaur bones," Cyrus replied. 

"Cool! Can I help?"

Cyrus gave the boy a scan up and down, searching for signs that he could be a traitor simply here to steal his knowledge and use it for himself, or a thief wanting to earn big money by taking Cyrus's hard-earned award for finding the bones. Cyrus found no evidence of either. 

"Sure."

The boy sat down with a smile and picked up a scooper for himself, beginning his own hole in the magic, blue sand. 

"I'm TJ," he said. 

"I'm Cyrus."

"Do you want to be friends?"

Seeing as TJ appeared to be the only other human in this jungle with him, making a comrade of him seemed like a wise decision. It may have very well been the only way he would make it out of these trees without being eaten alive. 

"Okay."

From then on, Cyrus and TJ were inseparable allies. They had many more sand adventures, and when they got tired of that, they found other missions to go on, though they were not without differences. One time, TJ attempted to teach Cyrus how to dribble a basketball, but Cyrus found it much more enjoyable to simply watch the taller boy instead. Their parents allied alongside them, strengthening their partnership, and they spent many days in each other's backyards, sword fighting or scouring the ground for bugs to recruit to their army to fight the enemy, also known as the neighbourhood cat who got out frequently. 

It was nearing the end of the school year when TJ lay in the grass of his backyard, which, because his mother was less than dependable when it came to mowing, was tall enough to block his view of the boy lying beside him. But TJ did not like when he couldn't see Cyrus, so he used three small rocks from his garden to hold down the green and clear his line of sight. Above his face was Cyrus's outstretched hand, which TJ was currently drawing on with a brown marker that he had taken from his mother's work desk. When he finished his artwork, Cyrus pulled his hand back to look at the masterpiece.

"It's a heart," said Cyrus. 

"Do you like it?" asked TJ. 

"I love it!"

The two boys tilted their heads to each other, falling into laughter as their eyes met. 

"My Auntie got married on Sunday," TJ said next.

"We could get married," Cyrus suggested. 

"No, we can't," TJ replied. "We're five."

"I'm six," Cyrus corrected. 

To TJ, that was a game changer. "Do you want to get married?"

"Do _you_ want to get married?" Cyrus rebounded.

The wedding took place about ten minutes later. TJ made bow ties out of construction paper which he and Cyrus wore. They didn't want to appear underdressed in front of their guests. Everyone important was here, including, but not limited to, Rocky, TJ's pet rock; Bear Bear, the bear; Daphne, the dolphin; and the ironically named Tiger, the dinosaur. Tiger officiated the wedding, and when the time came, TJ gave Cyrus a kiss on the cheek, leaving both boys giggling hysterically. 

That evening, TJ ate dinner with his mother. He swirled his spoon through his creamed corn, attempting to make mountains that would stay in place with the yellow mush, but they always sunk back down. 

"So what did you and Cyrus do today?" his mother asked. 

"We got married," TJ answered. 

His mother found that amusing. "That sounds fun. Did you each marry a stuffed animal?"

TJ shook his head, his eyes still focused on the creamed corn, which he was determined to make cooperate with him. "We married each other."

"Oh." His mother was not expecting that. "That's cute. You practiced for when you grow up and marry a girl for real."

"I don't want to marry a girl," TJ stated. "I want to marry Cyrus."

He shoved a scoop of the creamed corn into his mouth, deciding it was being too difficult and deserved to be eaten, although it was now cold, which was less enjoyable for him. 

"I see," his mother responded. 

"Can I tell you a secret?" TJ asked.

His mother perked up. "Yes?"

TJ dragged his spoon through his food while whispering, "I'm in love with Cyrus."

A week later, TJ and his mother moved to the great state of Nebraska. TJ's mother told him that she had found a terrific job there, and that he would be happier, but it was difficult for him to leave his pretend husband behind. TJ's mother promised he would make other friends, and he did. He made many other friends, and the picture frames in his bedroom that once held photos of him and Cyrus were slowly replaced by photos of TJ and his new friends, and then him and his basketball team, and then him and his girlfriend. And the photos of him and Cyrus were shoved to the bottom of a box of memories, stuck in the shadows of his attic, and forgotten about as time faded the moments he had with his childhood best friend to hardly anything more than just a name. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! This prologue is very different than the rest of the story will be. The rest will be written in Cyrus's and TJ's alternating POVs, and in present tense, but I felt this part was best told as a past in third person. I hope you're all excited, because I am SO excited, however I am going to work on Honey and Ethereal a lot now to try to get those farther. Anyway, I'll see you soon with the next chapter. Bye!


	2. Mildly Terrifying

**Cyrus's POV**

On the first day of school, everyone is always up and ready to be here, excited to see their friends after being revitalized by summer. The grade nines are avid to finally call themselves high schoolers. Andi has her locker renovation all planned out, down to the colour of every paper flower that will cover the inside of the door. Now, three weeks in, everybody's wishing for the holidays to come. The grade nines are less chipper, for they've figured out that they've just landed themselves right back at the bottom of the social pyramid when they came to Grant, and Andi's locker is complete. More people are late for school in the mornings now, which I don't mind, because it makes the hallway a little less crowded as I stand with Buffy and Andi at Jonah's locker, the three of us listening to him explain the English presentation he has to give today. 

"I didn't have time to read the book, so I just watched the movie," Jonah says. "But I've got it memorized. I've got a whole slide dedicated to Bugs Bunny's character development, and another for the way the aliens are a symbol for their own self-doubt. I got that part off a Tumblr page. And I talk about my favorite part, when Michael Jordan and the animals crush the aliens in the basketball game."

Buffy, Andi and I stare at him, all profoundly puzzled. After taking out a textbook from his locker, he spins around, and his smile fades as he sees our faces. 

"What?"

"Jonah," Buffy starts, "you sure you were watching _The Great Gatsby_ and not _Space Jam_?"

Jonah releases a sigh of realization. "My little sister does like to switch the DVDs around into different cases."

Buffy chuckles a little and puts a hand on his shoulder to comfort him. "Maybe your teacher will find your presentation refreshingly quirky and give you a good mark anyway."

"Or maybe we'll have a sub and have to push back the presentations. That happens a lot."

"You have a sub often?" Andi says in surprise. 

"Yeah. My teacher's Mr. Norman. He takes a lot of sick days, but everybody knows he's actually just playing golf and smoking."

"How is he not fired?" Andi questions.

Jonah shrugs. "Teachers' union."

"Yeah, I had him for novel studies last year," I say. "He was good at teaching when he was around. But there was one time when he dismissed class early because he didn't have enough copies of a book, and then we came back the next day, and he still didn't have enough copies. But I got a 98 in that class, so I didn't mind."

"Really?" Andi reacts. "I need to get a class with him. My english mark is not doing great. I swear persuasive essays were invented solely to make me cry."

My friends laugh at that and carry on with the conversation, but my mind gets captured by a figure beyond our group. A boy enters the hallway from the stairwell, stepping in alone. His eyes scan his surroundings continuously, like he doesn't know exactly where he's going. I've never seen him before, but something about him feels very familiar. He doesn't notice me watching him as he passes by, running his hand through his floppy, blonde hair. Almost as soon as he steers it out of his face, it falls back around it, framing his features with tousled strands. 

"Earth to Cyrus," Buffy says, snapping in front of my face, and my focus reels back to her. "You good?"

"Yeah," I reply. "I was just…" The boy goes up to a locker aways down the hall from me, looking at his phone as he slowly inputs the combination. "Does he look familiar to you?"

I nod in his direction, and my friends all shift their attention his way. 

Buffy the first to turn back to me, shaking her head. "No. I don't think I've see him before. He must be new."

"I just feel like I recognize him. I don't know where, though."

"He does kind of look like that guy from that Disney show." Andi tries to remember, a lightbulb sparking when she finally does. " _Sonny With a Chance_."

"Oh, yeah. I can sort of see it," Buffy agrees. 

No, he's not from a show. I know him from somewhere else. I just can't pin it exactly. Maybe I'll remember later. 

Later happens to come when I'm sitting in Mrs. Paslinski's science class, alone at a desk made for two. Everyone else has a lab partner, but mine happened to up and leave two days ago, right before beginning the kinetics unit, and doing labs on my own is not near as enjoyable as it is with a partner, even if my partner did blow his nose into his sleeve then wipe it on his pants… Actually, I'd rather not have a partner. 

Interrupting Mrs. Paslinkski's lecture on displacement comes the blonde boy from the hallway as he opens the door. He tries to be stealthy, but the squeak of the hinges betrays him, causing all eyes to whip toward him. 

"Ah, yes, the new student," Mrs. Paslinski says. 

"Sorry, I'm late," the boy responds, his eyes floundering through the air as they attempt to focus on the teacher and not at all the students staring at him. "I got lost finding the room."

"That's alright." She looks to the class. "Everyone, this is your new classmate, Thel—"

"TJ," the boy cuts in. "People call me TJ."

 _TJ._ Suddenly, the connection is made in my brain, and I remember where I've seen him before. I was friends with him. It was a long time ago. I think we were in kindergarten together. I wonder if he remembers that. 

"Lucky for you, TJ," Mrs. Paslinski says, "there is one student who recently lost a lab partner, so you can go join Cyrus at the back over there. You two will be partners for the rest of the semester."

TJ makes his way over to my desk and drops his backpack on the floor before getting comfortable on the stool next to me. In an attempt to make it look like I'm not staring, I only let my eyes drift onto him in fragments, returning back down to my notebook between glances. Each look reveals something new. On the first, his hair gleams gold under the lights from above. One the second, his jawline is structured and straight, and so is his nose, like they were carved out of marble. On the third, _he's exceedingly attractive._

"Alright, class! I have a great video on displacement to show you all, so let me just get it set up here."

Although we watch videos nearly every week in class, Mrs. Paslinski never ceases to struggle with navigating the spew of cords like tentacles falling out of the projector. They all look identical, so she always has to try every one before finding the right one, and somehow the right one is always the last one. While she's trying to figure that out, the class seeps into chatter, and I glance over at TJ. 

"I like your phone case," I say. 

It's just a plain red one, but it's the best conversation starter I can think of, since Jonah told me I need to stop beginning talks by describing the most recent discoveries in psychology. 

"Thanks," TJ responds. "I like your socks."

I look down at the objects of his admiration, my planetary-patterned crew socks.

"Thanks. My grandparents got them for me for my fifteenth birthday."

"You like outer space?"

"Not particularly," I admit. "I find the never-ending void of darkness mildly terrifying."

That makes him chuckle. 

"So," he starts, "what happened to your old lab partner?"

"He moved to Belgium," I answer. "He said chocolate here was appalling in comparison to chocolate there, so he had to leave."

Another laugh. It rings familiar in my mind, but it's lower and more controlled. He must remember me too, right? We were best friends. Although I don't remember much, I do recall his name and having play dates with him almost every day. It has been nearly ten years, though, so I wouldn't be surprised if he's forgotten. He's not saying anything about knowing me, so maybe the memory has faded from his mind. 

"Hey, can I borrow a pencil?" he asks after taking out his notebook. "I lent mine to a kid in my last class and never got it back."

"Only if you promise to give mine back," I say. 

"If I don't, you can sue me."

"I'll hold you to that," I say with a smile. "My aunt's a lawyer."

I pull out a spare pencil from my pencil case and place it in his hand, and he gives me a soft smile. 

"Thanks."

My sight stays on him as he begins to write on his page. His handwriting is messy, hardly legible. I can barely tell that he's writing the date. 

Should I mention that I know him? Maybe he's holding back too, worried that he's got the wrong person. 

"There we go!" Mrs. Paslinski cheers. "Now everybody hush. It's time to learn about displacement."

The video starts, and I tuck the thought away in my mind. I suppose I'll have to bring it up another time. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you found this first chapter nice. The next one will be a bit more exciting. It's going to be a slow burn, so y'all know. Anyway, have a lovely day. Goodbye! Oh, also yes, that was a reference to Adrenaline. Socks are just a gay thing to compliment, so I had to put it in.


	3. Place Your Bets

**TJ's POV**

Have you ever been in that situation where you're at the grocery store, or the mall, or the dentist, and you see that kid from your soccer team when you were eight, and you know him immediately, but you don't know whether or not you should say hi, so you both just look at each other, and you end up leaving without actually talking to each other? Well, it turns out I was in that situation. Not with the soccer team or the grocery store or immediately recognizing him. I needed to hear his name. But as soon as I heard that, it came back, though not as a flood. It was more like a leaky faucet, dripping another memory into the puddle every second that I was around him. The weirdest part of it is that I don't even remember many specific moments or actual events with him. But I remember the details, like hearing his voice ramble on and looking into his brown eyes. But he didn't say anything. Was he waiting for me to say something? Was it even him? Maybe it was just someone who looked like him. I haven't seen a photo of him in ages, so maybe the name just made me think it was him. 

"Hi, honey," my mom greets from her desk at the back of the living room. "Did you have a good first day?"

Our house here is smaller than ours was back in Nebraska. The reason we moved was because we have family here, and after being gone for almost ten years, my mom's most recent job contract ended there, and she couldn't find work again anyway, so she gave in to the pressure from her siblings and shipped our household back to Shadyside. It wasn't even a discussion, really. I was just expected to go along with it. Really what other choice did I have? I'm a fifteen year-old boy without a job. I can't exactly do much. And I wasn't totally opposed to the idea. Although it's still difficult breaking away from all my friends there, I've always felt this pull to Shadyside, even though I hardly remember it. I think it's probably because this is where my dad grew up, and where all my memories with him took place, before he died when I was four. I use the word "memories" loosely. I don't remember anything other than a bedtime story he once read to me and him lifting me up off the ground to pretend I was in a rocket ship. The rest, my mind filled in with photos and stories my mom told me. It's funny how just by hearing a story enough times, you start to feel like you genuinely remember being there, but you know you don't, because you're seeing it all in third-person. 

"Yeah, it was fine," I answer. 

"Did you make any friends?"

"Uh, not really friends."

"That's okay. I'm sure you'll make plenty soon."

"Yeah, uh, I'm gonna go to my room."

"Okay, but one more thing."

I stop walking and give her my attention for one more second. 

"We're going over to your Aunt Britta's house next weekend."

"Oh, okay," I respond. 

I don't know Aunt Britta that well, because I haven't seen her in forever, but if she's anything like how she sounds on the phone when my mom has her on speaker, I can conclude that she'll be loud and irritating. And I have cousins too, but they're all young, so I can't even get along with them like friends, except for one who's older, but I don't know anything about her besides her name. It's not like I ever talked to her when I was in Nebraska. Anyway, I'm just not sure whether or not I should be excited for meeting my family again. 

As I walk down the hall to my room, I scroll through Instapic on my phone. I'm still in the group chat with my friends, though I don't know how long that will last. Messages blow up constantly on there, most of them being memes that are slightly offensive but still funny. I ignore those, looking through the feed of photos instead. Looks like Zeke got a new car. Claire buzzed her hair off. Miles attempted to donate his sperm to make some extra cash but failed due to not being of legal age. Damn, it's like I leave, and suddenly my friends start making some big choices—and posting about them on their spam accounts. 

I pause for a second as I swipe over a selfie of a girl I know. Her red hair falls over the lacy sleeves of her lilac-coloured dress, and she has little heart emojis around her head. This is Bailey. We were best friends at the start of middle school, but then she asked me out in grade eight, and everything went downhill. Everyone said I probably just wasn't ready for a girlfriend. Honestly, I don't know if that's true. If it is, then I don't know if I'll ever be ready. Being around her was fine. it was the couply stuff that felt off. Going from friends to more than friends just made everything weird. 

I get to my room and plop down on my bed. After another while of reminiscing through Instapic, my eyes fall onto the many boxes on my floor that I've still yet to unpack. One of them is labelled 'photo albums'. _I wonder if he's in there._

I leave my phone on my quilt and kneel down on the hardwood. The cardboard lid lifts off easily, and I begin pulling the albums out one at a time, checking the years written on the cover of each one. When I find the correct book, I drop it down on the floor with a smack and begin searching the pages. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. _Something._

It's him. He looks much different now. His face has slimmed out and structured, and his teeth are straighter. He must've gotten braces since then. But he's still a bit shorter than me with wild, curly hair. We were friends back then. It's funny; I left friends in Nebraska and found one here. But it'd be dumb to think Cyrus and I would still be good friends now, right? People change. I don't know. It's probably all in my head, but he feels the same. 

_________________________________________

"Okay, class," Mrs. Paslinski says, "once you've gotten your lab kits, you can start."

Cyrus seems to know exactly what he's doing, which is good, because I have no clue. I got special tutoring for physics to help me with it in Nebraska, but I haven't set that up yet in Shadyside, so I'll have to do that. But for today, I'm just watching as Cyrus begins taking out the pieces for the ramp that we need to use for this lab. Next, he grabs the stopwatch, and I pick up the four marbles of various sizes from the bucket. 

"Hey, so," I start, "I'm not very good with numbers, so how about you do that part, and I'll do the not number things."

Cyrus immediately drops the parts of the ramp that he has yet to assemble. "Then you can figure this out, because I'm not good at this."

"Not much of a builder?" I presume. 

"When I was little, I would get annoyed with trying to recreate the structures on the Lego sets, so I just used them to build other things. I have three boats made up of pieces that were supposed to be for a Lego Death Star."

I chuckle and take over the job of connecting the ramp pieces. I do that while he weighs the marbles to find their masses. I'm definitely taking longer than I should, because I keep flicking my eyes back up to him. Then his eyes track mine, and we both end up just looking at each other for a second. He gives me a little smile, his cheeks blushing, and I finally can't hold back the question any longer. 

"Hey, did we go to kindergarten together?"

He puts down the marbles as he releases a breath, saying, "Okay, good. I'm not crazy."

We both laugh a little, letting our nerves dissolve. 

"Yeah, I thought I recognized you," I go on, "but I wasn't sure."

"Me too," he responds, his eyes sweeping me down and up. "You do look different."

"I'm glad I don't look the same as when I was five," I reply with a chuckle. 

"You definitely don't look five," he insists. 

"Same to you."

He continues to work on some calculations on a sheet while replying, "Thank you. I've been told I look twelve."

"If you said you were twelve, I probably wouldn't question it, but I wouldn't automatically assume you were twelve."

Cyrus shrugs. "I'll take it."

With the ramp now built and the pre-work complete, Cyrus brings the marbles around to me and places them in my hands.

"We're trying to see how fast each marble is moving at the end of the ramp," he explains. "I'll time it. All you have to do it drop one, let it roll, and then catch it before is rolls off the table."

"Got it," I reply. 

I bring the first one up to the top of the ramp, and Cyrus write something down. 

"Ready?" he asks. 

"Hold up. You gotta place your bets."

"What?"

"On which marble you think is gonna win. I'm betting on the blue one."

Cyrus looks at me for a moment with furrowed brows before letting out another laugh. 

"I'll bet on the orange one, since it is the biggest, and based on physics, it kind of has to be the fastest."

"Well, I always side with the underdog," I reply. 

He smiles and looks down at his timer before returning his eyes to me, saying, "Okay, ready now?"

I nod. 

"Three, two, one."

I let the marble go, and it glides down the ramp. I have to lunge to catch it at the other end. Cyrus records the time and passes me the next marble to repeat the process. This time, it flies off the edge of the table plummeting down underneath the neighbouring desk. The two girls there stare at me as I approach to grab it, but before I can, one of them bends down and picks it up for me. Her eyes flutter up toward mine as she gives the marble back to me, letting her fingers linger on palm. 

"It's TJ, right?" she says. 

"Uh, yeah. Sorry, I don't know your name."

"Idalia," she responds. 

"Nice to meet you," I say, not sure what else I'm supposed to say.

She giggles. "You too, but there are better ways to meet girls than to throw marbles at their feet," she teases. 

"Ha…yeah," I reply awkwardly. "Bye."

I spin around and return to the table with Cyrus where he's now glancing back and forth between me and the girl I just met, who I honestly can't remember the name of. 

"What?" I ask. 

"That girl was into you," he replies. 

"What? No."

He tilts his head. "Two of my best friends are girls, so although I'm not the best at reading signals, I can tell when a girl likes a boy."

"How?"

"There are signs, like their tell. Almost everyone has one. Like with her, she kept her hand on yours significantly longer than a platonic interaction entails."

I've never thought about that before. I wonder what other tells I've missed. I wonder what my tell is? Do I even have a tell? I don't remember doing anything out of the ordinary when Bailey and I were dating, but we also broke up in grade eight, so maybe I'm just forgetting. 

"What's your tell?" I ask. 

"I don't know," he replies. "I think it's different depending on the boy."

_Boy?_

"Wait, you're…?"

"Gay? Yeah," he confirms. 

"Oh." I wasn't expecting that, but then again, none of my friends back home are gay, so the thought that Cyrus might be gay never crossed my mind. "Neat."

A grin breaks through his face as he chuckles, saying, "Thanks." 

He moves on immediately, handing me the next marble. I suppose it's nothing weird to carry forth this fast. My brain is just processing slow. He's gay. That's cool. I mean, it's fine. Wait, so he was gay when we were friends in kindergarten too? I don't know why that takes me so long to understand. It kind of feels like being asked to draw an entire sketch, only to find out that what you drew was just the draft, and you still need to make the final version. 

After timing another marble, I try to strike up a conversation again, feeling bad for letting it drop after he said he was gay. 

"So, where are the good places to get food around here?" I ask. "I don't recognize many of the restaurants."

"Yeah, chain restaurants tend to skip Shadyside," Cyrus responds. "Except we do have three Olive Gardens."

I chuckle. "I've never been to the Olive Garden before. Is it true that they treat you like family?"

"Well, they don't ask uncomfortable questions in an attempt to access my unconscious, so in my case, no."

"Do your parents do that?"

"They're all psychologists."

"Oh, wow. Must be…interesting."

"It is," he agrees. "But back to food, The Spoon has the best milkshakes and baby taters."

"Thanks for the tip."

He passes me the last marble, and after that's been timed, I work to pack away the ramp while Cyrus does the math on the worksheet. By the time the whole setup is dismantled, Cyrus is done with the calculations. 

"I have bad news for you," he says. "Orange won."

"Damn," I huff. "Well, because I lost, I guess that means I have to give you pay you somehow, so how about I buy you a milkshake after school?"

He freezes with his eyes on me and a nervous simper on his face. "You want to take me out for milkshakes?"

"Yeah, but not like a date or anything," I add, realizing what it could otherwise sound like. "I just don't have any friends yet, so it'd be nice to make some."

"So I'm your first friend?" Cyrus responds. "I've never been that before. I feel kind of proud."

I laugh, and he smiles, and our gazes drizzle together like maple syrup over a plate, slowly sinking in and becoming just a part of our relationship. It's not awkward or tedious or forced. Looking at him is like riding a bike. Although it's been a lifetime, it comes so naturally, so much that my sense of time fades away, returning only when I hear Mrs. Paslinski's voice ordering us to focus on our schoolwork, and the two of us carry on with cleaning up the lab supplies. When his eyes flick to mine again, I can't hide my smile. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry that this is so long, but I didn't think it should be two parts. Anyway, I hope you all enjoyed it. I'm gonna work on Ethereal tomorrow and hopefully finish Honey today. Thanks for reading, and goodbye.


	4. Are You Afraid of Falling?

**Cyrus's POV**

TJ and I walk together after school to The Spoon. I've already noticed a few things about the way he conducts himself. He keeps his hands in his pockets. He looks at me whenever he laughs. He has the brightest green eyes. Every now and then, I find myself slipping back into the daydream that this could be a date. But I know it's not. He's just a really cute boy getting milkshakes with me. 

"You know," he starts as we continue down the sidewalk, "when I was little, I used to only step on the cracks in the sidewalk."

"Interesting. That completely contrasts the normal kid thing which is to avoid the cracks."

"I guess I was kinda weird," TJ responds with a smile. 

"I bet I was weirder," I argue. 

"I doubt it. I wore the same shirt and jeans every single day in grade one. I had other clothes, but I just refused to wear them."

"Well, I used to stay after class in elementary school so that I could ask my teachers about their psychological states to try to be like my Dad."

TJ lets out a chuckle. "Yeah, that's pretty weird."

"Hey, I can call myself weird, but you can't," I tell him. "That's a social rule."

"I don't know why, but I didn't peg you as someone who'd care about social rules."

"I don't. But I have a very vast knowledge of it. I do, however, have trouble applying it."

"Sounds like me and biology," he says, and I glance up at him as he explains, "I know all the names of the bones. I just don't know which bones they refer to."

I laugh at that, and TJ watches me for a moment before looking up and realizing we're at our destination. 

"Is this it?" he asks. 

I nod and step up to the door, but TJ reaches ahead and pushes open the door for me. I find it a little odd at first. None of my friends do this kind of thing for me, but I suppose TJ must just be used to chivalry. _And Jonah says chivalry is dead._

TJ selects a spot at a booth by the window, and I slide into the seat across from him. Right away, he reaches for the menu, and I wait patiently for him to consider his choices, not wanting to interrupt his thinking. But my staring apparently distracts him all the same as he looks up at me with a puzzled expression. 

"You aren't gonna pick something?" 

"Oh, I have the menu memorized," I explain. 

"You do?" His lips curl into a grin. "Then tell me, how are the baby taters?"

If I didn't know he was new to town before, I sure know now. 

"They're only the best thing ever invented," I reply. 

"Setting the bar high, I see."

"Well, I do have emotional attachment to them as well, so I could be biased."

He chuckles again, his eyes drifting toward the table for only a second before raising back to me. It's weird how natural this feels, how we haven't talked for years, but it feels like it's been only a day. I think the most peculiar part of this, though, is that I feel so connected to him, like I know him, when really I don't. I hardly remember anything about him from when we were kids, and even if I did, it wouldn't really matter, because he's not the five year-old boy from my kindergarten yearbook. He's this whole new person with different dreams and interests. It's like pulling out a garden and planting a new one. All the same foundation is there, but everything above has changed to the point where it looks almost unrecognizable. 

I spot Amber coming toward us as our server, and I wave as she approaches, but on TJ's face flashes a look of confusion. At first, I wonder if he's never seen a server before, but then she get's the same expression.

"TJ?" Amber says. 

"Yeah," he responds. "Hi, Amber."

"What am I missing?" I question. 

"Oh, uh, Cyrus, Amber is my cousin."

I glance between the two of them. Yeah, I guess I see it. Well, really the only similarity they have is their blonde hair, but then again, Buffy's cousins are red-headed, so that proves that you don't at all need to look like your cousins to be related. 

"How do you know her?" TJ asks. 

"She's my friend's girlfriend," I answer. 

That takes TJ by surprise for a second. Obviously, he wasn't expecting that answer. 

"Oh, cool," he responds after a second. 

"Yeah, so anyway," Amber says, "what can I get for you?"

We both order baby taters for ourselves, and of course, milkshakes. He gets a strawberry one, and I get chocolate as always. When we receive them, TJ watches me suck up the whipped cream through the blue paper straw, smiling as I do. 

"You're a big chocolate fan, I'm guessing?" he says. 

"Absolutely. If I could, I would live on chocolate."

"Well, technically, I guess you could. You'd just die a lot sooner."

"That's the problem, because there are still a lot of things I have yet to do."

"Like what?" he asks. 

I try to recall my list, disregarding the things I've decided are too unrealistic, like driving a car with more than four wheels. I can hardly drive a bike, and more wheels just seems like more disaster. 

"Um, like go to France."

"Hey, I've been there. But I was ten, so I don't remember much other than that it was loud, and there were lots of lights."

"That's vague," I tease. "What is something you still want to do?"

"I don't know," he answers. "Maybe go sky-diving."

Immediately, I begin shaking my head, and TJ raises his eyebrows. 

"What? You don't like sky-diving?"

"I don't like heights."

"Are you afraid of falling?"

"Yes, and it's completely rational. Humans don't have wings. Putting us miles up in the air is like shoving a cat underwater."

"Couldn't do that with a cat anyway," TJ says. "They're vicious. It would kill you if you tried. I know, because I had a cat."

"Then you had an aggressive cat," I respond with a laugh. 

"Yeah," he agrees. "But I can't blame the cat fully for that. I did try to make her float by tying a hundred balloons to her."

The rest of the conversation continues with the same ease. No matter how much we talk, we never run out of things to say, which is rare for me. I'm usually not the best at talking to strangers. But I suppose he's not a stranger. He's more like listening to an old song ten years later and still knowing all the words. 

At the end we're given our bills, and TJ glances across the table to try to look at mine. 

"What are you looking for?" I ask curiously. 

"Just seeing how much I should pay," he answers. 

I furrow my brows. "For my bill?"

"Yeah."

"You don't have to do that."

"Just let me be nice," he says. 

I back down, accepting the gesture. Does he do this for all his friends? Maybe chivalry is just ingrained into his bones, so he can't help himself. But still, he's paying for my food, something I've only ever done for boys on dates. _And this isn't a date?_

_________________________________________

As I enter the hallway, I notice TJ at his locker. When I wave to him, he smiles back, and for a second, he doesn't look away, like he's waiting for something else. Assuming that something else might be for me to go up to him, I start in his way, but I'm turned off course almost immediately when Buffy and Andi show up, sucking me into their current, going right. 

"You need to expand on your texts from last night, because they were very brief, and I have a lot of questions," Andi says. 

"About what?"

"About how your childhood friend suddenly comes to our school and asks you out."

"It was just as friends," I explain. 

"Really? Darn," Buffy responds. "I was hoping we'd finally have a boy to bug you about."

I haven't had a boyfriend before. I mean, there have been boys. I've dated and kissed boys before, but nothing ever lasted more than a month at the maximum. They were always sweet, but I just always felt a little out of place, like I was supposed to be somewhere else. Buffy and Andi started to wonder if I had issues with commitment or was maybe aromantic, but I assured them neither was true. I wanted a relationship, just not with those boys. It just felt like I was waiting for something but didn't know what.

"Yeah, well…I don't know."

Buffy and Andi share a glance. 

"You like him, don't you?" Buffy presses. 

"I don't _like him_ like him," I correct. "I think he's attractive and really sweet, but right now we're just friends."

"He's straight?" Buffy concludes. 

"Well, he hasn't outwardly stated that," I respond. "But he has not mentioned anything about being queer."

"I guess I'll get back to scouting out gay boys for you," Andi says. 

We carry on down the hallway, but before turning the corner, I glance back once more, seeing TJ's eyes looking right back at me. Instantly, he pulls his eyes away, but when he brings his sight to me again, I give him a smile, which he mirrors softly. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi. It's still slow-ish, but I'm just trying to make that build-up for when things start getting interesting. The next chapter will be more entertaining, I think. As always, thank you for taking the time to read this. I'll probably be updating this again tomorrow. I love you all. Bye!


	5. By Choice or By Accident

**TJ's POV**

"TJ!" comes my aunt's cheery voice.

She gives me a kiss on each cheek as soon as she and her two kids enter. 

"My goodness, aren't you getting big," she says. "Pretty soon you'll be moving out and marrying a beautiful woman who will run your bank account dry and drive off with your car, and you'll think to yourself, if you had only gotten a prenup—"

"Gill," my mother cuts in, "why don't you bring that tray of cookies you brought over to the kitchen?"

"Oh, of course, Lisa."

She follows my mom away, and now I'm just staring down at the two nine year-old twins who are fighting over the Nintendo Switch. 

"Hey, guys," I interrupt, "can you maybe move this talk out of the doorway?"

When they don't listen, I sneak behind them and close the door, which forces them to move forward anyway. These are May and Martin. I met them in person twice, I think, when they came to holiday dinners at my old house in Nebraska. But back then, they were only toddlers. This afternoon and evening will just be me letting a bunch of strangers into my house and being told to act like their best friend. 

My grandparents enter in with my other aunt and uncle, along with the four kids from their household. All of them live under one large roof in the richest neighbourhood of Shadyside. I've never been inside one of the houses there, but from the extravagance of their home-cooked sushi and vegetable dishes, I can already tell I'd feel out of place.

Noticing me standing alone against the wall, my mom comes over to give me a suggestion. 

"See if your cousins want to play a game or something."

I let out a sigh and go over to where the six of them are screaming and arguing in the living room. They're in the middle of a debate on which Disney show is better, and it's so heated, that going up to them with a smile feels like tickling an alligator.

"Hey, does anyone want to play a game?"

A few of them glance my way, but most just ignore me. I could go join the adults, but they're currently discussing their opinions on that new bill that might stop trans people from getting healthcare, and I honestly don't think I have the emotional energy to chime in on that. I'd also rather not learn which opinions each other my family members have. Sometimes it's just more preferable to live in ignorance for the sake of keeping the family bonds. 

I'm so relieved when the last group of relatives enters in. My aunt and uncle join the other adults in the dining room, and Amber sinks down in a chair near the fighting children. After a few minutes, she stands back up and makes her way over to me, crossing her arms as she leans against the wall with me. 

"So are you a loner by choice or by accident?" she asks. 

"I'm not big on debating," I reply. 

"Me neither. How's being in Shadyside?"

"Uh, it's good so far."

"You've been hanging out with Cyrus?"

"Yeah. We've been talking a lot."

I feel a smile on my face, but I don't know when it got there. Cyrus and I have seen each other several more times since our hangout, all of those times being in science class, which has quickly become my favorite class, because he's there. 

"So how often do you go to family dinners like this?" I ask. 

"Too often," she answers. "I love my family, but it's awkward. My parents still don't want to tell our relatives about my girlfriend, who I was supposed to go out with today, until my mom made me cancel. I wish she would give me a little more notice when plans like this are made."

"Yeah, I kinda wish I could see Cyrus today instead," I confess. "He said there was some fossil exhibit opening at the museum and invited me."

"You like fossils?" she says. 

"Not really, but Cyrus does, and I like being around him."

Amber and I both look around at the groups of people gabbing on without stopping for breath. 

"If you left now, would you still have time?" Amber suddenly asks. 

"Yeah, I guess. What are you—?"

"Hey, Mom!" Amber calls out. "Is it okay if TJ and I go hang out for a while? We'll be back for dinner."

The woman looks caught of guard but responds, "Uh, sure. I'm glad you're becoming friends with your cousin."

"Awesome. Thanks."

Amber looks back at me with a grin. 

"Do you lie often?" I wonder. 

She shrugs. "I may or may not sneak out when I'm grounded to see Andi."

I let out a chuckle. "You'll have to teach me your tricks."

I take out my phone and text Cyrus to see if he's still available. 

**Me:** Hey, you still want to go to the museum?

The response is almost immediate.

 **Cyrus** : Did your family thing get cancelled?

 **TJ:** Sort of.

 **Cyrus:** I can meet you there.

 **TJ:** Sounds good.

________________________________________

For some reason, I'm more nervous than the last time. My palms feel sweatier than usual, a bodily response that I didn't realize I even had. After getting through the doors, the museum opens up into a high ceiling with a large, crystal art piece dangling down in the centre of the spiral stairs that ring the space. But the most eye-catching thing here is Cyrus, who stands up from his bench when he sees me and begins walking over. We meet in the middle, stopping about a metre from each other, both of us just smiling. After a moment, he speaks. 

"Um, your text was a nice surprise."

"Yeah."

That's all I know how to say right now, and I'm mad at myself for it. Seriously? I can't think of anything else? I mean, I can think of a lot, but only things like how his smile is cute or how I like his eyes, and those things are relevant to anything at the moment. 

I follow him up the stairs to the first level of the museum where the fossil exhibit is. The walls are filled with hanging artifacts, and podiums hold display cases of rocks. The people here all walk around in wonder, but nobody looks more awestruck than Cyrus. The boy practically races up to the feature in the centre of the floor, a skeleton of a dinosaur with a name I can't pronounce. As I look at him, a memory suddenly comes back like wind blowing away dirt that's been covering it for years. 

"Do you remember when we used to hunt for dinosaur bones in your backyard?" I ask. 

Cyrus shifts his gaze onto me, and I feel a flutter in my chest at the contact. 

"I do," he responds. "We dug up so many holes that it ruined the grass."

"And we almost hit a pipeline one time."

We both laugh at the thought. I guess he hasn't changed that much. Sure, he's grown, but he still wants to find dinosaur bones. It's just that now he's found them. He's not looking anymore. And I realize as we walk from artifact to artifact, that I'm spending more time looking at him than at the exhibit. When I do eventually force myself to pay attention to what we're here for, I'm a little confused. 

"Why did they put a plain rock in a glass case?"

"It's not just a rock," Cyrus explains. "It has the imprint of a prehistoric crustacean."

"Well, either way, it rocks."

He lets out a small laugh as he raises his eyebrows. "You make puns?" 

Not usually, but apparently I do when I'm nervous. It's never happened before, but then again I've also never been this nervous. I don't know what it is about him. Maybe it's cause I want him to like me. But he already liked me when we met. Something just changed since the last time I saw him and today. Kind of like waiting a day after a workout and realizing you can lift so much more, except I'm not lifting anything, and I didn't work out. I just spent time with Cyrus, and now my body seems to think I can handle being pulled to him with more force than before. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi. I thought this was kinda cute. I didn't want it to be too much, because it's still gonna be a slow burn, but I'm really excited to write the next part. However, I'm gonna work on Ethereal first. I love you all. Thanks, as always, for reading.


	6. Probably Deluding Myself

**Cyrus's POV**

**TJ:** What are you doing tonight?"

The notification makes me smile, and I grab my phone off the couch to reply. 

**Me:** What are you doing?

 **TJ:** Nothing yet.

 **Me:** Well, what do you want to do?

 **TJ:** Go to The Spoon with you?

 **Me:** I'd love that. 

**TJ:** Cool! I'll meet you there.

I lock my phone and take a second to let my giddiness fade before starting my show again on the television. 

I've been seeing TJ a lot, almost more than my regular friends. But I just can't help it. Every time he texts me, we end up talking for hours, and then when we see each other, we continue the conversation. My life has become a series of notches on a wall that I'm climbing. Everything in between the grooves are just events to look at until I get to the next notch where I can see TJ again. I don't know what is at the top, and I'm a little scared to find out, because I fear I may be letting myself get too attached. 

This is what I think about as I sit inside The Spoon, a half an hour past the time TJ was supposed to get here. Did he forget? Were our plans just that unimportant that they slipped his mind? Was it only a matter of time before he got bored of me? 

The people around finish their meals, and it nears two hours. Amber pauses her task of collecting dirty dishes to come over to me, the last remaining customer in the diner. 

"I'm sorry, Cyrus," she says. 

"What? Why?"

"Because you're crying."

Oh, yeah. I am. I don't know why. It's stupid. I have other friends. I don't need TJ for that. But there was just something about him. He looked at me a certain way that nobody else did, and I don't know whether that was just old memories he was seeing or if he really thought I was special, but I fell for it. I knew he couldn't like me the way I wanted him to, but I think my heart forgot about that, because I let myself start feelings things for him that I didn't realize I felt until now. Isn't that just the cruelest irony? I realize I have a crush on a boy when that very boy stands me up. I couldn't care about any other boy this much, even though I actually had a chance with then, and the boy whose name tints my tears is a straight boy who doesn't even care enough about me to show up. 

"I'm alright," I mutter. "I was probably deluding myself anyway."

Amber frowns and sits down on the other side of the booth. 

"Cyrus, I don't know my cousin that well," she says, "but one thing I do know is how much he likes being around you."

"How do you do that?"

"He told me. Maybe he has a good reason for running late."

"Two hours late?"

"I don't know," she sighs. "I'm supposed to close up now, but feel free to stay until you're ready to go."

I shake my head. "It's okay. There's no point in waiting any longer."

I push myself onto my feet, feeling my stomach settle even lower into a pit. The worst part of this is that if it were anyone else, I would've left after he didn't text me back. But I stayed, because I desperately wanted him to come. How am I supposed to face him at school now? This is all so humiliating. 

I step out into the black night lit by street lamps, hearing the hum of cars rolling past on their ways home. I bet they're excited to get home so that they can see their families and laugh together. Meanwhile, I'm just looking forward to having a pillow to cry into. Right when I start toward my house, I hear a shout coming from behind me. 

"Cyrus! Cyrus! Wait!"

That can't be him. But it is. He's running in my direction, slowing down in front of me as he pants for air. He's two hours late. But he came. Why?

"I'm really sorry," he says through his heavy breaths. "I was downtown, so I had to take the bus, and then it broke down, so I had to take a second bus, and then that broke down, so I had to run here—"

"And you couldn't text to say that?" I question. 

"My phone died."

"You don't keep your phone charged?"

"I'm not good at planning ahead. Is it too late to hang out with you?" 

His eyes beg me to forgive him, and I don't think it'd be possible for me to be mad even if I tried. But just that fact that he wants my forgiveness makes the air in my chest whirl like a loop of wind has picked it up, carrying a bunch of fluttering autumn leaves with it. I had accepted that he stood me up, but he didn't. He doesn't not care about me. He ran Lord knows how far to come to me to make sure I knew he wanted to be here. He's so thoughtful, and if I wasn't falling for him before, I sure am now. I should probably stop myself, break away from him now before I get too deep. But I can't. It's simply impossible. 

"Well, The Spoon is closed," I say. 

"We don't need The Spoon," he replies. "I found a place on the way here."

"What place?"

"Just follow me."

He waves for me to come, and I do. Our shadows trail behind us as we trace the sidewalks. When we get to a crosslight, the walk-symbol shines as soon as we hit the button, making way for the two of us to steal the night as if we're in some kind of Hollywood movie. At just past ten, there are no cars around, save for one that zips by every once in a while, and no other people are on the street. The walk lights change for us, and the streets are bathed in yellow, filtering our picture without either of us having to even touch a camera. Eventually, he stops in the middle of a park, one I've never been to before. 

"Here it is," he says. 

I look around at the open grass surrounded by trees. There doesn't appear to be anything special about it, but TJ's smile tells me that I must be wrong. When he sees that I'm not getting it, he touches my shoulder and points upward, but the touch makes my looking-up reaction delay. Above me, the trees tower like a cityscape, and along the tops of them are glowing coloured lights. They're little lanterns that have been hung in the branches, creating a circle of rainbow magic around the park. 

"It's better if you lie down," TJ says before doing just that. 

He sprawls out on the grass, and I settle down behind him, lying my body down in line with his. Our feet are pointed in opposite directions, and the tops of our heads are one in front of the other nearly close enough to touch. From here, the colours seem to stretch out across the black sky, tinting it like dye and mixing together to create new hues. The sky is no longer just a dark pit. It's a glorious pool of chromaticity, raining down on the two of us like the moonlight washed into it. 

"How did you find this?" I wonder. 

"I tripped and looked up," TJ confesses with a laugh, and that makes me smile. 

I can't see him, but I can feel him near me. It's this vibration in the earth that powers my pulse and gives me comfort. 

"I like the way it turns the nothing into something," TJ says after a moment. 

"I like it too," I respond, my voice being soaked up by the intensity above us. 

We could stand up now and move on, but we don't. We continue to lie here, muted by the sight, but the lack of sound only fuels the waves that threaten to roll my boat onto his shore. I feel my hands begin to drift toward my head like wood in a river. The current takes them closer to TJ until I manage to catch myself, and I freeze right here. _He doesn't want this,_ I tell myself. _He's straight._

But then I feel his fingers find mine, and they carefully intertwine, winding around each other like the strands of a rope. He doesn't speak, so I don't either. We both just remain watching the sky, wading in the rainbow overhead. I'm now realizing that I really have no idea what he wants. But I know what I hope he wants.

_______________________________________

It's two in the morning when I get home, and I can already hear my parents' yelling in my head even before I step in and see my mom's worried face morph into fury at the sight of me. 

"I'm sorry," I say right away but she just shoves it aside. 

"Cyrus, do you know how worried I was?" 

"I'm sorry," I repeat. "I was with a friend, and we fell asleep."

"I was up thinking about all the bad things that could've happened to you! You never do things like this!"

"I know. I'll make sure I'm more careful from now on," I tell her. 

"You sure will," she says, "or else you won't be seeing your friends for a long time."

"I understand," I mutter. 

I did text her, but only after I woke up, which was just after one in the morning. I feel terrible about scaring her, but even so, I don't think I'd say I regret it. I fell asleep on the grass holding the hands of TJ Kippen, and I think the contact must've influenced my dreams, because the dreams I had were all about him, and his smile, and his laugh, and his touch that lit me up light a match. 

"Okay," my mom breathes. "Now go to bed. You have school tomorrow."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Thank you for reading this. We're finally getting to some more action. Next chapter should be interesting I think. I love you, lovelies. Goodbye.


	7. It's Nice to Have a Friend

**Cyrus's POV**   
  
  


All day at school, I just wait for science class to start. When it finally does, I sit anxiously in my seat, both eager to see TJ and terrified. Part of me wonders if what happened last night was just a dream. I know I got home late, because I received an extra scolding from my mother in the morning, but did I only imagine holding hands with TJ? Maybe that too was just another figment of my dreams.

When he enters the classroom, only seconds from being late, my smile immediately finds his, and I keep my eyes on him his whole trip to our desk. After sitting on his stool, he bends down to get out his notebook and pencil. As he rises back up, he runs a hand through his hair to sweep it out of his eyes, and that action alone is overwhelmingly attractive. I wonder if he knows what he's doing. He must know it. It seems blatantly obvious that those little moves, like touching his hair or giving me a soft wry smile, make me forget my own name for a moment.

"So how'd your parents take to you getting home late?" TJ asks.

I break off my staring and answer the question. "Um, well, my mom was pretty upset. If I'm late again, I'm grounded."

"So you're not grounded yet?" he checks.

"That's correct. What about your mom?"

"Oh, she didn't even notice," he responds. "I told her I was gonna be out late anyway, so she went to sleep and just left a note on the door for me to set the alarm before going to bed."

"Do you stay out till two am often?" I question.

"No, but she has to wake up early to get to her job, because the commute is long, so she's always asleep by nine, and she didn't know how late I was out."

"You're lucky you have a very trusting mom."

"Yeah. Could be a problem if anything did happen to me, but she'd figure it out in the morning. Anyway, since you're not grounded," he says, "any chance you'd want to come over after school? I have Jurassic Park on DVD."

"Why would I want to watch Jurassic Park?" I ask.

He shrugs. "It has dinosaurs in it."

"Scientifically inaccurate ones," I respond.

"So are you saying no?"

"No, I'm saying yes, but you need to work on your bribery."

He chuckles, and Mrs. Paslinski claps, pulling the class's attention up to her, but TJ and I remain looking at each other for a second longer.

___________________________________________

**TJ's POV**   
  
  


When Cyrus steps into my house, he looks around in awe at the plain house as though it's a mansion rather than a tiny bungalow with cream walls and brown furniture. It's actually really cute to watch, and I end up staring at him until I hear my mom's footsteps enter from the kitchen.

"Hi, TJ, how was your...day."

She basically freezes when she sees Cyrus. I'm not sure if maybe she recognizes him or if she just didn't expect me to have any friends to bring over. When Cyrus turns his eyes to her, she quickly finds a smile to wear, but her eyes are still shocked.

"Hey, Mom, do you remember Cyrus?" I ask.

"Of course I do," she says, her voice sounding a little uncertain.

"Hi, Ms. Kippen," Cyrus says.

She just nods then brings her eyes to me again, saying, "So you two are friends now?"

"Yeah," I answer. "Uh, we're gonna watch a movie if that's cool."

Her lips are tightly pursed as she responds, "Mmhmm."

I'm a little thrown off by how weird she's being, so I turn to Cyrus, ready to leave.

"Hey, the movie's in my room, so I'm gonna grab that if you wanna come."

He follows me down the hall, and I open the door for him to enter my room. He gazes up at the red walls and shelves of records and cassettes, wandering around to examine all the photos of my friends in frames. While I go to get the DVD, Cyrus pulls me away with his voice.

"You have a picture of us," he says.

I spin around to see him looking at one of the frames on my desk. It used to be a picture of one of my old friends back in Nebraska, but I switched it out a few days ago for a photo of Cyrus and I at the museum. I found myself looking at it on my phone a lot anyway, so I thought I might as well save my phone battery and just put it in a frame. Cyrus's eyes reflect the photo in them, making the image glow twice as bright. I think that might be a hidden ability of his that I didn't know of until recently. Anything he looks at simply becomes better. Maybe that's why I held his hands last night—because I wanted to see if touching him would do even more. And it did. It made the colours turn into a rainbow and painted my spirit in the lights. It made me feel a way I never had before.

"Yeah, um..." I say, although my voice is a little raspy, and I can't tell why. "I thought this was a good picture."

Cyrus steps, turning in my direction, and I feel a force like a wave crash down on me, slowing this moment as my eyes drag down to his lips. This isn't normal for me, this attraction I have toward him. It's making me question what my actual intentions with him are. Do I really want to be his friend? Would I be okay with that? Honestly, I'm not sure if I would. I think I might want more.

He detours past me before I can think to do anything, heading toward my shelf of records.

"You really like music, huh?" he comments.

I have probably close to a hundred vinyls of various rock bands, most vintage, and some new. But many of the new ones are starting to look vintage with how often I've played them. He flips through the display, peeking at albums like _The_ _White Album, Electric Ladyland, and Led Zeppelin._ Then he stops and pulls out one album in particular, and I feel my face turning red in embarrassment.

"You listen to Taylor Swift?" he says, holding the blue and pink sleeve for _Lover._

"Um..." I don't know how to respond, afraid he's going to think It's weird or girly. "Yes..."

Rather than make fun of me, he smiles.

"What's your favorite song by her?" he asks.

I feel my worry dissolve as I say, "You don't think it's weird?"

"No," he says, surprised. "I love it. I like that you aren't just what you show on the outside. You have layers."

My nerves come back at that, but not from fear. Instead, they return as a wind that sweeps up the butterflies in my stomach, using the energy he gives me from his eyes.

"Um, I'll play it," I say.

I take the record from him and bring it over to the record player, finding the spot to begin the song I'm looking for: "[It's Nice to Have a Friend](https://youtu.be/eaP1VswBF28)". As the music starts, Cyrus sits down on my bed, and I lean against the wall by the music player, feeling too nervous to go join him. But his eyes keep me tethered as they flick from the spinning vinyl to me, his smile growing as we listen to the lyrics.

"It's a nice song," he says about halfway through.

Then he returns to listening, and I continue watching him. I like the way his curly hair falls over his forehead and how he has slight dimples when he smiles. And I like how he makes me feel like it's summer in the fall. And when the last note of the song finishes, it rings in my head for a moment longer, and suddenly, it makes sense. It makes sense why these feelings are so new and why I couldn't like my old girlfriend the way she deserved, and why Cyrus makes me so nervous but in a good way that I didn't have the words to describe. I'm gay—and I have a crush on Cyrus.

_________________________________________

I watch through the window as Cyrus walks down the street, going toward his home in the evening. I said goodbye at the door, but I just want to keep him in my view for a little longer. When I finally turn back around, I see my mom standing with her hands clasped together and an uncomfortable smile on her face.

"Yeah?" I question.

She doesn't even hesitate before saying, "I don't want you seeing Cyrus anymore."

And I don't hesitate before exploding. "What? Why not?"

"I can't explain it all to you," she replies, "but the way things ended with our family and his before we left was bad, and I don't want you back in that situation again."

She's calm, and that makes me even more mad.

"What situation? You have to give me a reason!"

"I'm your mother!" she snaps. "That's your reason."

"This is bullshit!"

"I'm sorry you feel that way," she says, folding her arms over her chest.

I give her a glare that could rumble a building enough to make it collapse, but she stays stiff. She seriously wants me to stay away from the boy I just realized I liked. And she's not even giving me a rational explanation for it. She just expects me to trust her. And maybe I should. She's never done anything without reason before. Maybe she knows something about Cyrus that I don't, something that will only break my heart in the future if I pursue this. Still, I don't know if I even could stay away from him if I tried. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so I can't remember if I was supposed to update Ethereal today instead, but oh well. I updated this. I'll be doing Ethereal tomorrow. Love you guys! Bye! Also, credit to @disneyswiftie on Wattpad for the idea about TJ liking Taylor Swift. <3


	8. Do You Want to Stop?

**Cyrus's POV**

TJ stands at his locker, taking his time to trade books from it before first period. Going over to him has become instinctual. It's simply something that feels right, so I do it. But he doesn't greet me with the regular smile. 

"Hi," I say.

"Oh, hi," he responds, his tone draggy. 

"Uh, how are you?" I ask. 

"Good, but, um, I have to stop somewhere before class, so I'll, uh, see you later, okay?"

"Um, okay."

He gives me a tight smile while closing his locker, and just like that, he leaves. This is weird, to say the least. It's like he's actively avoiding me. Or maybe I'm just reading too much into this. He could have something he needs to do, or he could just be feeling down and want to be alone. It could have nothing to do with me. 

"Cyrus," sounds Buffy's voice, and I turn to see her, Andi, and Jonah all approaching me. 

"Waiting by TJ's locker, I see," Andi notes. 

"Not anymore," I mumble and begin walking with them. "What's new?"

"How about we start with you?" Buffy suggests. "Because you seem to be with TJ all the time now. What's that about? Do you like him or are you just friends?"

"Um…I don't really know," I confess. 

"How can you not know?" Jonah questions. 

"Hey," Andi says to him, "Amber and I didn't know we were dating for a month, so it's completely possible to not know."

"He held my hand the other day," I say, smiling at the memory, "and we fell asleep together at a park."

"Aww!" Andi sounds. "That's—"

"Gay," Jonah finishes for her.

"I was gonna say cute," Andi says. 

"I thought TJ might like me," I explain, "but when I tried to talk to him today, he got away as soon as he could."

"He could just be uncomfortable with his sexuality," Buffy points out. "If he thought he was straight before, then this would be a lot for him."

"Yeah," I breathe. "Or he could just not like me that way at all."

"But you like him?" Buffy checks. 

I let out a sigh and nod. I kinda wish I didn't, because with him being weird this morning, I really don't need drama in my life, but who am I kidding? I obviously like TJ. I only hope those feelings are mutual. 

________________________________________

I've been waiting all day to be able to see TJ again, and now that it's science class, I finally can. During my other classes, I had convinced myself that TJ wasn't meaning to seem distant this morning, but I'm hit with a cold truth when he gets his books out beside me without even giving me a look. 

"Hey," I say gently. 

"Hey," he replies. 

He still doesn't look at me, but he looks stressed as he starts scribbling notes on his page. He never takes notes. I always have to share my notes, which I don't mind doing, because it means he needs me. 

Concerned, I let out a heavy breath and ask, "Did I do something wrong?"

That puts his soft look back in his eyes as he glances over at me and shakes his head, saying, "No, I… I just don't really know what to do right now."

"Do about what?" 

He shakes his head, returning his eyes to his notebook. "Nothing. It's—it's nothing. Just forget I said anything."

"That won't be hard to do when you aren't saying anything anyway," I mutter. 

I can tell that that stings him a little bit, and I regret it immediately, but before I can apologize, Ms. Paslinski shouts to us to quiet down and pay attention. I give TJ one last look before landing my eyes down on my books. But I don't plan on letting this go. 

_________________________________________

**TJ's POV**

I'm relieved when the bell rings, because it means I won't have to sit through this uncomfortable tension with Cyrus any longer, and I can go home. I don't want to avoid him, but I need time to figure this out. Should I listen to my mom? She's never given me a reason not to. But she's also being very unreasonable, and I like Cyrus. I like him a lot. Even if I tried to stay away from him, would I be able to? My question is answered for me when Cyrus takes me by the hand, pulling me down the hallway, and I don't fight it. I want him to give me a reason to not believe my mom. I just don't know how I'm supposed to completely disobey her without feeling horribly guilty. Cyrus leads me into the thin stairwell at the end of the hall. I didn't even know there were more stairs upward from this floor, but he takes me up them, and we end up stopping in a little nook by a door to the gym balcony that nobody even goes to ever. Here, it's just me and him, and I don't think I could leave if I tried. He's holding me here, not with his hands but with his eyes, and moving away even a little bit burns like stepping into acid, so I stay, standing half a metre apart, covered by the walls from everyone except him. 

"Can you talk to me?" he says. "What's going on with you?"

"Nothing," I repeat, feeling even more sick from the lie. 

"It's not nothing," Cyrus presses.

The hurt in his eyes boils the air, making it feel stuffy in my lungs, and it only gets worse and worse until it's too much for me to handle. 

"You want to know?" I respond, my voice on the edge of exploding. "My mom doesn't want me talking to you anymore."

He looks baffled by that. "Why?"

"I don't know," I admit. "She says something happened when we were younger, but it just seems stupid, and I don't know what to do, because I don't want to ignore my mom, but I just figured out that I like you…"

I stop talking, realizing what I just confessed, and Cyrus's eyes hold mine with their curiosity. 

"You like me in what way?" he asks. 

How do I put this? Will he hate me? I guess if he does, it won't be so hard to stay away from him. 

"In a gay way," I respond, my voice almost cracking. 

For a brief moment, it's just tension as the acid rises behind me, and his eyes tie me in place. I am physically incapable of walking away, and the only other direction is toward him, but I'm too scared. And then the string connecting us turns into a spring, and Cyrus pulls in, taking my face in his hands and kissing me. It feels like a wind tossing all the bad feelings away and replacing them with summer heat and ocean spray, things that make me want to dive in and keep him in this moment. 

His eyes ripple over me as his lips drag away, and I feel my body trying to get used to being without him again, but it doesn't feel right. 

"My mom would be screaming if she knew what we were doing," I say. 

"Do you want to stop?" Cyrus asks. 

My answer is instant. "No."

I dive back into him and kiss him again. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello. I hope you liked this. Uh, yeah, that's all. Love you. Bye!


	9. Jeff's

**TJ's POV**

Now I know how Hannah Montana felt. I have to watch what I say when I'm around my mom, like the way I filter my swearing but now with something way bigger, my boyfriend. I tell her I'm going to Jeff's house. I don't know a Jeff. But she hasn't questioned it yet. After a week of hearing about me going to see my friend, Jeff, she did, however ask about what he looks like. I showed her a Pinterest photo of some random teenager holding up a fish, the straightest looking thing I could find. Because I'm keeping Cyrus a secret, I also haven't told her about me being gay. That would only lead her to ask how I know, and...well...Jeff isn't it. 

"I'm going to Jeff's!" I call upstairs.

"Alright!" my mom shouts back. 

It's getting closer to winter, and therefore unyieldingly colder with each day. As soon as I step outside, I regret not bringing gloves, but I don't want to have to backtrack, so I keep my hands stuffed inside my jacket pockets the whole walk to Cyrus's house. I know the path with my eyes closed. I know, because I try closing my eyes for a while out of curiosity. The directions are etched so deeply into my mind that I believe I could end up sleepwalking there if my body wanted to. 

When I get there, I hesitate to ring the doorbell. I've only ever been here when only Cyrus was home, but he says he has a mom and step-dad who live here too. Every time I get up to the door, I always do this; I always take a second to stress about whether or not they'll like me if they are home. Will they also not want me around Cyrus? How far does this "something" that my mom mentioned extend to? 

I don't even ring. The door is answered, and Cyrus looks at me with a kind smile. 

"Hi, TJ," he says, and I get butterflies just from that.

Nobody ever talks about it, but I swear something magical happens when someone says your name. Not just with crushes, although that is significantly better. It happens with anyone. You can be plain people who just casually talk in the halls until one day the other person says your name, and suddenly it's like popping a bubble that's been distorting your view, and you see them differently. They become a new face, and you question if you really have seen them before, because you're noticing things that couldn't have possibly been there a minute ago. You notice the creases in their skin, the highlights in their hair, the cute roughness of their voice. But with Cyrus, it's like seeing the world through a microscope, not in a judgemental way, but just to admire. Everything about him starts to grow in vibrance, like rainbow lights, and he's officially completed the spell he's been casting on me since we met again this year. 

"TJ?" he says again, pulling me out of my head. 

"Yeah, sorry, Cyrus."

He blushes a little at the sound of his own name, confirming that we're both equally as deep into this fall. 

I step inside his home, and its unique scent surrounds me. It smells like Cyrus, but more. That's probably why I like being here so much. But we're not staying. We have plans to go to the park together. Cyrus grabs his jacket and pulls it on. We're about to go when a woman suddenly enters the room from the kitchen. She has dark hair like Cyrus's and a shocked but friendly smile.

"Cyrus," she says, "you didn't tell me your boyfriend was TJ Kippen."

She's not familiar to me at all, but I must know her, because she knows me. I haven't had one of these awkward meetings in a while, but I suppose I'll do the same thing as I used to do when my mom would introduce me to people whom I'd supposedly met before, although because I was hardly able to even talk when I met them, I had no idea who they were. 

"Hi," I say. 

"Yeah, Mom, um, he moved back here a while ago," Cyrus explains. 

"Well, it's nice to see you two being friends again," Cyrus's mom says. 

Cyrus and I give share a glance, both of us smiling but trying to suppress it. 

"We're going to the park," Cyrus tells his mom. 

"Sounds good. Have fun."

The juxtaposition of his mom next to my mom is perplexing. The colossal jump from my mother forbidding me to see Cyrus to Cyrus's mom wishing us a good time makes me question the validity of this entire situation. But I hardly have time to think too deeply into it, for Cyrus's hand is touching mine while we walk, and it would be just plain wrong for me to not hold it. When I wind my hand into his, he glances up at me with a smile. It's so weird, because although this should be all still new since we've only held hands a few other times, it feels familiar, like we've been together like this before when we were younger. I suppose we could have, but two little boys who have held hands wouldn't be out of the ordinary. Little kids do that kind of thing all the time. 

Then the swings come into sight, and I have the urge to rush, pulling Cyrus with me. We've never been on the swings before, but something about seeing them here feels like we should be, like in an alternate universe, this is where we connected. 

"How long has it been since you've been on a swing?" I ask him. 

"Not long," he admits. "I actually come here a lot just to think."

"Then you can probably swing higher than me."

"I wouldn't be so sure about that," he counters. "I'm not a heights person."

I chuckle and let go of his hand, taking one of the two swings to start rocking back and forth. Cyrus sits down on the other swing and pushes himself forward, but he doesn't even get a metre off the ground. Seeing this, I jump off my swing and run around to the back of his to start pushing him, and he screams, but not in a scared way, more like in a cute scared way. Then I launch him forward and duck underneath. 

"Underdog!"

He falls back down, laughing. With his eyes watching mine now, he lets his feet drag on the ground to stop him until we're just staring at each other with no excuse to not kiss. 

"See," I say. "Heights aren't scary."

"Oh, that was terrifying," he states with a small chuckle, "but I liked it."

It takes the two of us another moment of being caught on the same line to realize that we can snap that line tight to pull us in, but once we do realize it, I take his face in my hands, and he steals my waist, pulling himself up to his feet so that he can kiss me. And strangely, something about this feels familiar too, like winds from the same storm crashing into each other again in a valley of flowers, like we had it good before, but what we have now is beyond everything we were. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi. I recently found my poetic wave again, so that's why I took a little longer to update this. I was getting back my paintbrush that I felt I was losing. I love you all, and I hope you liked this chapter. It's all downhill from here, folks, just so you know.


	10. Something Happened

**Cyrus's POV**   
  
  


What a perfect coincidence. TJ Kippen and I, boyfriends, lab partners for our chemistry lessons. He likes to whisper in my ear sweet things that make me laugh, and I tell him to pay attention. He says we have more chemistry than our teacher could ever teach him anyway. I say I can't argue with that. I share my notes later, because our chemistry doesn't involve helium and hydrogen like the class is about. But there is oxygen. That element is shared with every touch of his hand that pumps my lungs and spins my heart in a somersault. When we are together, we are in our element.

TJ keeps his eyes ahead on the projector screen, but his hand crosses the desk over onto my notebook, and I look over at him curiously. His pen begins sketching along the margin of my page. I can't see the image until he's done. It's a tiny heart. Good thing, too, because I need it to replace mine which has gone into overdrive from my feelings.

I reach my own pencil over and copy the drawing onto his notebook, but I add rays around the heart like a sun. When I remove my hand, he smiles at me, and I get a flashback of this smile in winter snow. Five years old. It's the angle he's looking at me from, and his wry lips. It's those things that splash me back into the sunlight from that day, and the glistening of the snow we were playing in. And then it's gone. That's all I see, just a quick second. Strange how the memory works. I hadn't thought about him for so long that I assumed I'd never remember more than I already did, but I suppose there are still a couple tiny moments that I have yet to discover.

He leans in, and when the teacher starts a new sentence, TJ starts to whisper, "I saw that bakery nearby. Haven't been inside it yet, though."

"Is that an invitation or just a statement?" I ask.

"Any time I tell you something, just assume I want you there."

And so the plans are made, added to our own period table of elements, but each element is a moment. Each moment is a building block in what makes up our entire world of each other.

Before meeting TJ after class, we split apart to go to our own lockers, and when I'm glancing back at him to see if he's looking at me too—he is—my friends interfere with my gaze.

"So," Buffy says, "how's the secret romance going?"

"Interesting," I reply. "His mom is very adamant about me not seeing TJ, but I have no idea why."

"Why?" Jonah questions. "Adults usually love you. You're basically a young old person."

"Like he said," Buffy responds, "he doesn't know why."

"How long do you think you guys will have to keep it a secret?" Andi wonders.

"I don't know," I answer.

I don't know. Hopefully not long. I want to be able to be back in his room and listen to his records again and feel the carpet of his room. But is not being able to do that a deal breaker for us? Not at all. I just want him. I'm reminded of that when we're walking down the sidewalk toward the bakery, cars passing us by, and he suddenly stops and turns to me. He lets my hand go, which would be disappointing if I didn't know where this was going. The only reason he ever lets me go is if he either has to leave or wants to get even closer, and this instance is the latter.

TJ steps forward, backing me into brick wall of a storefront. It's cold, but I'm smiling, waiting in anticipation for when he pins me up and kisses me. I love it. It's become a sort of game we play. Who can make the most cinematic moment out of a kiss. I've tried, but he always wins. He's more spontaneous than me. I like that about him.

He backs away and takes my hand again, pulling me along down the sidewalk, although I'm dazed and reeling still from the kiss. The couple walking ahead of us glance back, but I can't tell whether they're judging or not. I'd like to think they're just admiring, wishing they had what we have.

"What's your favorite kind of muffin?" I ask TJ as we walk.

"Not sure."

"Well, what would be your ideal muffin?"

"Maybe...blueberry macadamia."

"You might have trouble finding one of those," I respond with a laugh.

"Maybe they can make a special order. What's your ideal muffin?"

"Chocolate chocolate chip," I answer.

"You really like chocolate, huh?"

"Chocolate is objectively the best flavour of anything," I reply.

That makes him laugh too, and we approach the bakery. Our hands remain locked as TJ reaches for the door, but I circle around him to grab it instead.

"You always open the door for me," I say. "It's my turn to open it for you."

"What a gentleman," he comments with a grin.

The moment our eyes leave each other, our smiles are sliced by the stunned expression of TJ's mother staring at us from inside. It looks like she was just about to leave, because she holds a bag of baked goods and is stopped right in front of us. TJ drops my hand after a minute, realizing we probably shouldn't push this situation any farther, and my head begins reeling again, but this time from the fear that this could be the last block on our table of memories.

"TJ?" his mother mutters.

TJ remains frozen. "Ummm..."

________________________________________

"Cyrus?" my mom says when I enter into our house, and she sees my glum face. "Are you okay?"

I shake my head. "No."

I go over and flop down next to her on the living room couch, bringing my legs up to be criss-cross. My mom waits for me to talk, but I don't know where to begin. Everything was so perfect, and then it came crashing down like an avalanche in seconds.

"You know how TJ and I have been dating?" I say.

"Yes."

"Well, TJ's mom didn't actually know about that, and she didn't even want me talking to TJ. We ran into her today, and...well, you can probably put together the rest. I just don't know why she doesn't like me. It's not because I'm dating TJ. She didn't like me before that. Apparently something happened when we were little, but I don't know what."

Tears are streaking my cheeks, but there's no point in wiping them away. They're only going to come back again anyway. And my mother loses her look of empathy. Instead, her mouth opens like she's having an epiphany.

"Of course," my mom huffs. "I should've confronted her as soon as I found out she moved back here, but I didn't think it was necessary. She couldn't let her son be happy then, and she still can't now. I figured she'd have grown past this."

"Mom, what are you talking about?" I ask.

"When Lisa and TJ moved, she claimed it was for work, but it didn't make sense. I thinks she was starting to notice that TJ was gay."

"How would she have known that?" I question, but my mother isn't paying attention to me anymore. She's in her own thoughts now.

"You know what?" she says. "I'm going to go have a talk with her."

She gets up and starts for the door, and I hurry to follow, because I'm lost on what's happening anymore, but I want to know.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Stuff stuff stuff is happening. Nearing the end of the story, but I won't say how many chapters are left. I love you all very much. Have a lovely night or morning, depending on when I post this!


	11. Why We Moved

**TJ's POV**

"Mom!"

"TJ, I told you not to see him, and you defied me. End of story."

I slam the front door shut as my mom marches toward her own room. Even in the car, she wouldn't let me speak. She wouldn't talk at all. It's like she's trying to completely avoid talking about what happened. But I can't not talk about it. I'm sick of avoiding it. I need her to understand. 

"Mom!" I shout, "Why can't I see Cyrus!"

She halts in the hallway and spins around, replying, "There are just too many things you wouldn't understand."

"No, I think you don't understand!" I yell. I'm so angry that the fumes are turning into tears in my eyes. "I like Cyrus! I really like him! I think I always have. Not like my old girlfriend. I like him in a way that I didn't realize I could before him."

My mom stares at me, but she doesn't look shocked like I thought she would. She just looks sad.

"I'm gay!" I shout, and the rumbling of my pulse tips my tears out like an open faucet. 

My mom exhales heavily and comes back out of the hallway to sit down on a chair in the living room. I follow her over but remain standing, trying to read what's going to happen next, but this all just seems so peculiar that I don't know what to expect. 

"I know," she says, her voice calm and steady. 

"You know?"

"Yes, TJ," she snaps. "I'm not oblivious."

"But… Then you get why I can't not see Cyrus."

"I—" She stops. "I maintain my stance—"

"You've got to be kidding! Are you disappointed in me? Do you wish I was straight?"

"No, TJ, that's…"

The doorbell stops her speech, and we both look over at the window to see Cyrus and his mother standing on the doorstep. I wonder if my mom will be more or less reasonable with him present. My mom hesitates before answering the door, and immediately Cyrus's mother comes storming in. 

"I really can't believe you, Lisa! Ten years later, and you're still a bigoted, close-minded woman. Why are you still keeping them apart? Are you just that cruel that you can't let our sons be together?"

"No!" my mom defends. "I didn't…" She sighs. "Since I suppose there's no reason to keep up this any longer, TJ, do you want to know why we moved?"

"Wasn't it for your job?" I question. 

My mom shakes her head. "Sit down."

Mom sinks down into her chair again, and Lisa sits on the chair across from her, looking surprised that my mom is actually willing to tell the truth, but I have no idea what truth she's talking about. Cyrus's eyes find mine, and the world seems to lighten as he comes over to me, following me toward the couch. As soon as we sit down, our hands drift together without trying, and I notice my mom's eyes flicker down to them before changing her sight. 

"I did find a job," my mom starts, "but that's not why we moved. Um…TJ, you and Cyrus were best friends. You played together almost every day. Well, one day at dinner, you told me something that scared me. You said you loved him, and you told me what you and Cyrus did that day. You two had your own little wedding to each other."

Cyrus and I are both speechless at that. I knew I felt a connection to Cyrus, but I didn't realize just how real that was. 

"We got married?" I finally say. 

"That's so cute," Cyrus piggybacks on. 

I glance over at him, and he's smiling softly at me. Most fifteen year-old boys would be terrified at the mention of marriage, and maybe I should be too. Until kissing Cyrus, I was content with growing old alone and starting my own radio show or something. But now I might want to change that course. I guess that's how you know you're with the right person, because suddenly only being with one person doesn't seem so scary so long as it's this person holding my hand. I'm not saying I plan on marrying him, but if I had to get fake-married to anyone, it only feels right that it was to Cyrus. 

"You were only little, and you knew you cared for each other," Mom says, her eyes welling up. "The thought of my son being gay, and at so young, was shocking, and I didn't know much about how being gay worked back then, so I thought it was best to take you somewhere else. I thought I was helping you. Now I know I was just misinformed."

"So if you've gotten over the gay part," Cyrus's mom says, "then why couldn't you let them see each other now?"

"Because it's humiliating, Leslie!" my mom sobs. "We were friends too, and after having moved away, I thought you would've lost all respect for me. It was awful, I know, and I suppose I went about handling this the wrong way, but you must see how mortifying facing all this is."

"Well, what matters is you realized your mistake," Leslie responds. 

"Does this mean I can keep dating Cyrus?" I ask. 

Maybe I should be more sympathetic or care more about my mom's journey of changing beliefs, but really all I care about is Cyrus. I just want to make sure that my heart won't be crushed if I celebrate now, and when my mom gives me a nod, a huge smile breaks free. I pull Cyrus in and kiss his head, which he gives back as a kiss on my cheek. It tingles, centring my energy in that one spot where his lips touch. It's enough for now, but not enough forever, a worry I had before he came here. Before, I was thinking about our kiss outside against the storefront and wishing I could go back and keep him longer, kiss him harder, make a memory that would be enough to feed me without him from then on. But I don't need to do that anymore, because this isn't all we have. We have so much more. We have days in science class, passing notes while the teacher talks. We have surprise kisses on the sidewalk and cute grins that I question if mine will ever go away. And it doesn't. Sure, it flickers, like the clouds pass over the sun, but it always comes back. It comes back with every hand touch and every stolen glance. It comes back for evenings in his room playing board games and late nights in mine listening to music. 

It's one of those nights, two months later, when he's sitting cross-legged on the floor of my bedroom, searching through my shelf of records for one he hasn't heard before. Meanwhile, I'm looking at him, finding sparkles that I've never seen shine so bright. And it hits me that this brightness isn't from the lights or even from him. It's from us, from the way the two of us glow when we're together. 

I heard somewhere that the body reacts to love the same way it reacts to cocaine. Love is a drug. It becomes something you need and love, because your experience of life is completely different. It's more vivid. There's a rhythm in every creek and rattle and breath. There's a pain when I'm away from the boy and a high when I'm with him. This isn't just a crush anymore. But honestly, I think it was more than that from the start. 

Cyrus pulls out a record from my shelf and examines the cover. 

"What's your favorite song on here?" he asks. 

From where I sit on the bed, I can't see the track list on the record sleeve, but I know exactly which song I want him to play. 

"Track 12," I answer. 

Cyrus takes the record over to the turntable and finds the song, dropping the stylus on that line. My heart pumps loudly as the song begins, and I wait for Cyrus to realize what I'm doing. When the chorus comes on, Cyrus picks up the record sleeve again and looks curiously at the track list. I know he sees it when his eyes go wide, and he looks up at me. He then glances back down at the song list, and then returns his eyes to the turntable, trying not to act strange. He probably doesn't know if it's a coincidence or not that the song is called "[I Love You](https://youtu.be/ObG48PZHU2k)."

Quietly, he comments, "It's a nice song—"

"I love you," I cut him off, and he whips his focus back at me again.

I can't tell if he's scared or happy, and for a second I think I made a mistake in telling him. But it's the truth. I love him. I shouldn't feel sorry for the truth. I swallow hard under the suspense until he finally responds. 

"It should be track 2," Cyrus says, "because I love you too."

I crack into a grin. "That's cheesy."

"I know," Cyrus replies. 

"I love that."

He crawls forward, and I lean over, kissing him hard enough to let the high of love suck me out of myself and into him, and he opens every gate for me. This is the love I've heard about in fairytales. But this fairytale is real. It's mine, and so is he.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One more part, which will be coming on Wednesday most likely. I won't be posting anything tomorrow because of blackout tuesday. For those of you who don't know, it is a day to turn off all social media and streaming and everything to show respect and solidarity with the black lives matter movement. The only thing you post is a blank black page. And with that, I love you all. Happy pride month. Black Lives Matter. You are all safe and welcome in my account. Please stay safe and keep moving forward.


	12. Epilogue

**TJ's POV**

Summertime with Cyrus has its own scent, one like sugar in the breeze. The grass is a green blur lining the left of my vision with Cyrus owning the rest as the two of us lie together in his backyard. He has a pond now with a fountain, which trickles underneath the sounds of the bees collecting pollen from the garden. But my senses are all focused on the green pen that Cyrus is using to draw on my hand. I'm actually sad when he stops and gives me back my palm to see his masterpiece, because I like the serene sensation that overwhelms me when he draws on my skin, but the image he drew makes me smile. It's a heart. 

"You should be an artist," I comment, and Cyrus laughs. 

"My heart drawings wouldn't sell for that much."

"I would buy them."

"Yeah, well, you get them for free, so that doesn't matter."

I look at him, studying the lines of his face for a moment. Like crashing wave, I wash up to him, my lips colliding with his with the intensity of an ocean, and he reciprocates the kiss with the gentleness of a sand. I am the water, and he is the shore. Without him, I have nowhere to land, nowhere to build. He opens up a whole new world of life to my underwater soul. And he rolls on top of me, becoming the wave rolling, and I become the coast, accepting my weakness to this force of nature. And when the waters cool, his head lays upon my chest, our arms wrapped up like seaweed to the rocks, and it's quiet, the loudest sound being our heartbeats doing breaststrokes inside of us. 

"TJ," Cyrus suddenly says, calling the world to listen to him, "what if we did get married?"

If we did get married, I would love him the same as I do now. If we did get married, I think the ground would quake from our power. I think that must be how Earth was created. The land and water got married. 

"We're only sixteen," I respond softly. 

"Oh, yeah," the boy says, his voice dim. 

"But," I say, "when we're older..." 

"When we're older..."

"I'll ask you to marry me."

Cyrus's hand lifts mine onto his stomach to rest there with his, and I feel at peace. 

"For now," Cyrus says, "we're just...to be betrothed."

I chuckle. "If that's what you want to call it, then yes."

I tilt my head up to see Cyrus smile before letting myself look back up at the cerulean sky. 

"You know," Cyrus says, "there are lots of things we can do before we get married."

I smile like a flower blossoming for the sun. "I look forward to anything I get to do with you."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And here's the final part. I hope you all enjoyed this story. I really appreciate everyone who's been reading. I'm going to focus most of my energy on The Good Hair Family Sitcom now, especially since I'm hopefully going to be starting working again soon for the summer, at which point episodes will take longer to write, so I want as much time for that as possible. Again, thank you so much, and I love you guys. Bye!


End file.
